Airmead was struck by this wolf"s gentle manners. How kind of him to include her a" she who was no use at all to anyone. She was an Obea, and most wolves, MacHeaths or otherwise, looked skittishly at barren females. Especially other she-wolves. She was thankful that Brangwen"s mate, Morag, was blind and might not sense her barren state. But then again, it was said that blind animals" awareness of smell was sharper than creatures who could see.
Airmead didn"t need to worry. Morag seemed only happy to meet the two MacHeath she-wolves. She betrayed no sign of sensing that Airmead had been an Obea. There was not the slightest twitch of her nostrils to indicate that she"d picked up a whiff of Airmead"s sterility.
"Well," Morag said. "A clan can always use another outflanker. I"m not sure what they"ll do with me." She spoke in an almost cheerful manner.
"Now, my dear, you can"t see," Brangwen offered, "but you"ll be a good auntie." Aunting behavior was common among wolves. If a she-wolf was too busy to mind her pups, another she-wolf often stepped in.
"I"m a good auntie because as an outflanker I had to depend on other good aunts when I was out on byrrgis. I appreciate what they did for my pups." A shadow pa.s.sed through Morag"s eyes and there was the dimmest pulse of green behind the milky film that covered them.
"No one can tell stories to pups like Morag," Brangwen continued. "She has a true gift for the old ones, the stories of the Long Ago."
Both Katria"s and Airmead"s tails drooped. There was rarely any storytelling among the MacHeaths. They did not value the tales of the Long Ago, when the wolves had first arrived after the Ice March. They lived only in the strife-torn depravity of their own here and now, smug in their ignorance of the past and the rich lore of the wolves of the Beyond. The MacHeaths didn"t even have a proper skreeleen. One of the tasks of a skreeleen was to read the sky fire to tell stories. The MacHeaths only had one ancient, nasty female whose sole tasks were to croak out territorial boundaries and announce what prey was in the region.
The four wolves returned to the trail. Morag seemed to gain confidence in the company of strong she-wolves, and Brangwen noticed that her pace had picked up. Airmead trotted behind Morag, and Katria was right at her shoulder, gently guiding her just as she might have initiated a flanking action to bend a byrrgis on the hunt.
"We must be nearing the camp," Brangwen called out. "Look at this fog rolling in. We"re close to the northern sea. The Bittersea, I believe they call it."
Mist began threading the air and quickly they were enveloped in an immense cloud that seemed to have settled across the land. The tips of their guard hairs were soon bristling with drops of vapor, and their pace slowed.
"How come we"re going slower?" Morag asked.
"The fog. We can"t see much."
"Maybe I should lead." Morag chuckled good-naturedly. Katria and Airmead gasped.
"What are you gasping about?" Morag asked.
"You made a a a a"
"A joke?" Morag asked.
"Yes. Is that what you call it? A joke?"
"Yes. Great Lupus, haven"t you ever heard anyone make a joke before?"
"No," Katria and Airmead answered at once.
"Not in the MacHeath clan," Airmead clarified.
"And certainly not about one"s self," Katria added.
"Well, that"s a that"s too bad," Morag replied. She could think of nothing else to say.
A short time later, the fog rolled out again and they caught sight of two wolves coming toward them. "Scouts!" Brangwen exclaimed. "They must be scouts from the MacNamara clan."
"You mean we"ve arrived?" Morag said.
Brangwen began to howl a greeting and when the scouts drew close, the four traveling companions fell to their knees and began the submission postures.
They were cut short as Brangwen had cut short Katria and Airmead. A large she-wolf with a creamy gray pelt that looked almost like her own private fog stepped forward.
"Welcome. You are welcome. We have seen you coming since dawn. I must apologize for the Namara. She regretted that she was unable to greet you personally. She usually does, but I am afraid you have arrived on the eve of what might be a catastrophe."
"A catastrophe?" Brangwen asked.
"Oh, dear," whispered Morag.
"What is the trouble?" Katria asked.
"The bears a" the bears near the Ring are rising up against the wolves."
"But we"ve always lived in peace with the bears, especially in the territory of the Ring. This is impossible!" Brangwen said.
"Let"s hope," said the other scout, a dark gray male. "Let"s hope," he repeated.
Katria and Airmead exchanged glances, and Katria began to speak. "We know something of this. I"m ashamed to say that we did little to stop it. It"s the MacHeaths" doing, and it"s why we finally gained the courage to leave." Katria paused.
The scout shoved her ears forward. "You must come with me directly and tell what you know to the Namara. Perhaps you can help us avoid a this a this a" She was hesitant to say the word that hung unspoken in the air. "Please just follow me."
Morag in her blindness sensed a deeper darkness a" the shadow of war.
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN.
GRAYMALKIN.
IT WAS FAOLAN"S SECOND DOUBLE shift, and then he had been promised two nights off entirely. Something was going on at the Ring, but neither he nor Edme was sure quite what it was. As new members of the Watch, they were not included in the gaddergovern, the meetings in which business matters of the Watch were discussed. But tempers were short, and even the ever-patient Twistling was snappish with Faolan.
The She-Winds had abated and fewer owls were streaming in. It was mostly Rogue smiths who had stayed to tend the temporary forges they had set up.
Gwynneth had stayed, and for this Faolan was deeply grateful. He and Edme had learned almost as much from Gwynneth as they had from Malachy, the taiga who specialized in owl studies. It was Gwynneth who really made them feel what it was like to live an owl"s life, even though she was a hermit and lived mostly in the Beyond.
But Gwynneth seemed to know less about what was going on at the Ring than they did.
"Double shifts?" she had asked with mild surprise. "Now that the She-Winds are lessening, I can"t figure out why that would be necessary."
"Yes. See, there"s Edme. She"s just leaving her cairn by Morgan a" and late at that. Her replacement must have been delayed. It seems like the taigas are always in a gaddergovern with the Fengo or some other high-ranking Watch lords." Faolan paused. "Could you find out anything, maybe?" Faolan asked in a beseeching tone that Gwynneth had never heard him use.
"Absolutely not! You"re asking me to gizzle!"
"Gizzle? What"s that?"
"To sneak in and hear something. Thus the name slipgizzle. In short, spy!" Gwynneth spat out the word. "Their stock-in-trade is information. I have no time or trust for such owls. I am no slipgizzle!"
"I didn"t say you were," he replied. "I have to get back to my jumps."
"Don"t be angry," Gwynneth said, suddenly contrite. "I tend to go off a bit about slipgizzles. They have their place in owl society. And they"ve done a lot of good. The Great Tree is very dependent on them."
"All right. I"m sorry I asked you."
"Don"t worry," Gwynneth said as she began to spread her wings. Effortlessly, she lifted into flight.
As so often happened when Faolan stood close to owls or watched them take off into the sky, he seemed to feel stirrings deep within him, whispers from another time or another world. But it wasn"t just when he watched owls. These whispers had started coming to him during his Slaan Leat, his journey toward truth. There was a truth out there still waiting for him, and every once in a while, he caught a glimpse of it. Sometimes when he did his leaps, especially the high ones where he rode the warm drifts to wolf"s peak, he felt as though he was coming close to catching mists or wraiths from the past.
Owls called them scrooms, wolves mist or lochin. These mists from an unreachable past seemed to seep through his mind. He felt sometimes as if he were trespa.s.sing on someone else"s memories or dreams. But it was not his fault. He could never quite figure out what prompted these moments. And when they occurred, he felt as if he were a wolf out of time.
When he had completed his scanning jump and landed back on the cairn, he looked down and spotted Edme.
"Going off duty?" he asked. Edme looked up at him.
"Yes, finally!"
"I"m on until dawn. Why aren"t you back in the den already asleep?"
"I don"t know. I find it hard to sleep. It seems like the whole Ring is holding its breath and n.o.body is telling us anything."
"It"s not just us. Gwynneth came by and she doesn"t know any more than we do." Faolan tipped his head skyward, scanning for graymalkins. From the corner of one eye, he caught sight of a Spotted Owl lingering low in the sky on the southeastern edge of the crater. He felt a funny twitch in his marrow. Was this owl cratering? Should he howl the graymalkin alarm? He listened for the brittle crunching that was said sometimes to emanate from the crater when a graymalkin approached, but he heard nothing. False alarms were not looked upon kindly. Besides, it was not really the season for graymalkins. They usually came with the She-Winds, flying under the camouflage of the throngs of colliers and Rogue smiths streaming in. Still he was nervous.
"I"m going up!" he said to Edme. "Wait here."
Edme was so tired by this point that she could not have managed a hop. So she settled herself on the cairn"s platform and tipped her head to follow Faolan"s jump.
He was a magnificent jumper, no doubt about it. The tales of when he leaped over a wall of fire had swept across the Beyond. She had not witnessed it, but those who did had said they"d never seen anything like it. That alone should have qualified him for the Ring.
"What in the name of Glaux!" Edme muttered as she looked up. She had begun to take up many of the owl expressions and milder swear words. She watched Faolan reach out and grab what looked like an ordinary Spotted Owl. Before she could wonder, Faolan was back on top of the cairn.
He dropped the owl and quickly pinned it down with his starboard forepaw.
"I didn"t mean to! Honest, I didn"t mean it!" The owl was hysterical.
"Faolan, a graymalkin!"
"I think so."
"Well, why didn"t you howl the alarm?"
Faolan looked at her blankly. "I"m not really sure."
"That"s unconscionable! You could get into a lot of trouble."
"I didn"t want to send a false alarm. I just thought there was something a""
"Don"t, don"t, don"t! Please don"t sound any alarm," the owl pleaded.
"Why were you hanging around over the crater? There weren"t any coals shooting out. The She-Winds are gone. What"s your excuse?" Faolan"s voice was rising.
"All right, all right. I just a I just a" the owl sputtered.
"You just what?" Edme stomped down on his other wing.
"I did it on a dare," the Spotted Owl blurted out.
"A dare!" Faolan said. "Are you yoicks?"
"Yes, definitely. I am completely, totally, eternally yoicks."
"But why?" Edme asked.
"I was sick of them making fun of me. I wasn"t really going to take the ember if I saw it. But Skylar said that sometimes after the She-Winds blow out, you can see the ember float to the top."
"Skylar is full of wet p.o.o.p!" Faolan said. This was one of the nastier owl curses because owls prided themselves on their discreet and n.o.ble digestive systems, which allowed them to produce neatly packaged pellets, unlike other birds who excreted white splats.
"Probably, but I just wanted a well, you know, for them a to like me. I fly funny. You saw it. That"s why you caught me so easily. My port wing tip is turned funny."
"That is no excuse! Look at Edme. She has one eye. Look at me." Faolan shifted his weight so he could hold down the Spotted Owl"s wing and lift up his splayed paw. "Have a look, idiot!"
"That"s, uh, some paw!"
"It certainly is. And I"ve learned to live with it a" very well, I might add a" as Edme has learned to live with one eye. And guess what else?"
"What?" the owl asked in a trembling voice.
"We were never accepted until we came here. We were gnaw wolves, bitten and beaten up, the last ones at the kill allowed to eat."
"I"m really sorry."
"Sorry!" Edme exclaimed with contempt.
"Are you going to howl the alarm?"
"We should," Faolan replied.
"No, you shouldn"t," the owl said quickly.
"Why not?" Faolan asked.
"Because I know something a something important." His yellow eyes had a sudden crafty shimmer. "I know about a cubnapping!"